To me, the biggest drawback is its popularity: the hardware is insanely fragmented. Want to write a Symbian app? Browse the device list http://www.symbian.org/devices

App developers have to support:1) mix of touch and non touch screens2) Insanely different display resolutions3) Crazy list of hardware buttons (some have keyboards, some none, some have the 10 digit numeric, etc.)4) Different form factors (clamshell, block, etc.)

Basically, writing a very good, elegant app that people WANT TO PAY FOR in Symbian is a disaster. Best to write for iOS and Android. Although both hardware platforms are fragmented they are not nearly as bad to deal with as Symbian. That, and there's a culture of "It's OK and normal to buy apps" (much more so on iOS than Android, of course) that doesn't appear to exist on other platforms (yet).

Why, in this day and age, are we talking about NUMBERS? Do we address websites via IP address? No, we have DNS.

Why isn't there a DNS for phones? I pick a name, perhaps even something as simple and unique as MY EMAIL ADDRESS, and then anyone who knows my email address can contact me. Or, just like DNS, I can set up any number of unique names for various things (my-recruiters@gmail;) that point to some sort of numeric based phone.

Posted
by
kdawsonon Friday October 09, 2009 @10:14AM
from the trois-grèves dept.

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been caught violating someone's copyright again. This time, presidential services made 400 unauthorized copies of a DVD when only 50 had been made by the publisher. Mr. Sarkozy, of course, is the one pushing the HADOPI law, which would disconnect the Internet service of an alleged pirate after three allegations of infringement. This isn't the first time he's been connected to copyright violations, either. His party had to pay some €30K for using a song without authorization. If he were he subject to his own law, Mr. Sarkozy would be subject to having his Net disconnected the next time he pirates something."

RAM is dirt cheap and most server systems support significantly more RAM than most people bother to install. For critical systems, ECC works but that doesn't prevent everything (double bit errors etc.). Is it time for a Redundant Array of Inexpensive DIMMs? Many HA servers now support Memory Mirroring (aka RAID-1 http://www.rackaid.com/resources/rackaid-blog/server-dysfunction/memory_mirroring_to_the_rescue/) but should there be more research into different RAID levels for memory (RAID5-6, 10, etc?)

MattRog writes: "We're relocating a rack or two of servers from our office's datacenter (Lexington, KY) to a co-loc facility about 100 miles away in Cincinnati, OH. For reasons which should be obvious (insurance, insanity, etc.), we are looking for a dedicated hardware relocation provider to disassemble, crate, and ship to Cincy. The co-loc facility will do the uncrating and re-racking.

Googling provides a TON of "AWESOME" providers, but has anyone worked with a provider to do this? Is there a place that rates this type of moving provider (http://www.movingscam.com/forum/ is a great resource, but doesn't target this sort of business relocation service)?

Posted
by
CmdrTacoon Tuesday October 28, 2008 @04:11PM
from the because-he-said-so dept.

An anonymous reader writes "API Lead at Twitter, Alex Payne, writes today that the Internet was 'built wrong,' and continues to be accepted as an inferior system, due to a software engineering philosophy called Worse Is Better. 'We now know, for example, that IPv4 won't scale to the projected size of the future Internet. We know too that near-universal deployment of technologies with inadequate security and trust models, like SMTP, can mean millions if not billions lost to electronic crime, defensive measures, and reduced productivity,' says Payne, who calls for a 'content-centric approach to networking.' Payne doesn't mention, however, that his own system, Twitter, was built wrong and is consistently down."

According to scientists, due to increased demand from sources such as biofuels (not exactly "renewable" if the inputs aren't!), we will exhaust our supply of non-renewable phosphorus in 50 to 130 years. If you didn't know, phosphorus is one of three major nutrients for plant growth: nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Without phosphorus it's tough to grow crops. As the USGS wrote, "There are no substitutes for phosphorus in agriculture."

Posted
by
kdawsonon Tuesday June 17, 2008 @04:09PM
from the and-don't-tell-me-to-use-emacs dept.

cconnell writes "I am working on a PhD in software engineering at Tufts University. My interest are the general principles of good software design, and I am looking for links/references on this topic. The question is: What design/architecture qualities are shared by all good software? Good software means lacking in bugs, maintainable, modifiable, scalable, etc... Please don't tell me 'use object oriented methods' or 'try extreme programming.' These answers are too narrow, since there is good software written in COBOL, and by 1000-person teams for DoD projects. I am looking for general design principles. If it helps, I am trying to build on the ideas in this article from some years back."